


the odd uneven time

by ionlyloveyouironically



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: AFTG Summer Exchange, Fluff, M/M, Summer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-14 07:25:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15383652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ionlyloveyouironically/pseuds/ionlyloveyouironically
Summary: “So? Y’all? An Airbnb, just the five of us, beach getaway, come on! It’ll be nice to be able to just spend time together without worrying about anything, right?”Andrew and Kevin ignored him from their places in the beanbag chairs, battling for first place on Mario Kart, while Aaron looked like he was thinking it over, so Neil asked, “Where to?”





	the odd uneven time

**Author's Note:**

> This is my aftg summer exchange fic for [Andrew](https://angstie-gaykeepers.tumblr.com/) whom i cherish and adore. Hope you like it!
> 
> Follow me on [twitter](http://www.twitter.com/1980salienboi) and [tumblr](http://1980salienboi.tumblr.com/)

“Oh my _god_ ,” Nicky says, throwing himself over Kevin’s lap to better look out the window of the Maserati, “this place is so cute!”

“You don’t even know anything about houses,” Kevin grumbles, pushing Nicky back into his own seat and scrambling out of the car as soon as Andrew puts it in park.

The house itself is a large bungalow with a well-maintained front lawn, the grass freshly mowed and a little flower garden brightening up the porch area. Not bad for what they’re paying to stay a few days here, Neil supposes, but then again he doesn’t really care for these things the way Nicky seems to.

Andrew doesn’t spare the place a second glance after making sure it’s the right address. He gets out of the car and goes back to the trunk to begin throwing out everyone’s luggage onto the driveway.

“The grass smells so good!” Nicky says, starfished on the lawn and taking deep breaths. “They must have had it mowed yesterday.”

“Why are you smelling the grass?” Kevin asks, face wrinkled in bemused disgust.

“It’s, like, his favorite smell,” Aaron answers, staring down at his cousin from beside Kevin. “He used to try to make me and Andrew mow the lawn every Saturday just so he could smell it.”

“Wrong, I used to _ask_ y’all to mow every weekend because one, I was afraid of the creatures possibly living in the jungle that is the backyard, and _two_ , chores help establish a child’s sense of responsibility and gives them a sense of accomplishment-”

“Is that what those parenting books told you?” Aaron asked flatly.

Neil ignores them in favor of following Andrew to the trunk and grabbing their bags before Andrew can, which earns him nothing more than a dirty look as Andrew slams the trunk with just a touch more force than necessary. Neil follows him as he cuts across the lawn to the front door and unlocks it, leaving the rest of their family to scramble to their bags and follow them inside.

The inside is of the house is quaint, tidy, and, most importantly, cool, the low hum of the air conditioning a pleasant background noise. Neil follows Andrew down a hallway and watches him inspect the bedrooms before picking one. “Put the bags down,” he says, gesturing towards the lone bed in the room.

He and Andrew are no strangers to bed sharing. They do it more often than not in Columbia, and Andrew seems to be growing steadily more accustomed to a welcome presence in bed with him. Neil never takes this for granted, feels honored that he is the one Andrew allows behind his defenses in such a way. So he only smiles over at Andrew as he places their bags on the bed, earning a dirty look and an eyeroll before Andrew leaves the room again.

There isn’t another moment of peace after that, but that’s not really what this trip is about. The girls have just graduated from Palmetto State and scattered to the winds with Matt in tow, leaving Neil and the rest of his family in South Carolina to contemplate something Matt had said to Kevin just a few days prior at the graduation ceremony.

\-----

Heat and humidity that had Neil feeling sympathy for Dan, Allison, and Renee below them on the football field. A sea of grads in their black gowns. A stubborn bead of sweat making its way down Andrew’s temple. Matt clapping Kevin on the shoulder and saying, “One more year, and that’s us, man.”

 _One more year._ The words had struck something inside of Neil because, of course, Matt was right. Next year it would be him and Kevin. And then it would be the cousins. And then, after a solitary year, it would be Neil, too. He’d known that on a subconscious level the same as he knew they were in different classes, but the reality hadn’t really stuck him until he was sitting there in the football stands watching the first three members of his family prepare to leave him.

He’d never really cared enough about anyone to worry about leaving them, and had never known what being left behind was like until he’d had to bury his mother on an unknown point on the California coastline. But this feels something akin to abandonment, even though he knows logically that’s not what it is.

So Nicky, similarly affected, had later proposed one last hurrah for the monsters.

“This isn’t our last summer, though,” Aaron said, sitting upside down on the couch.

“It’s our last summer with Kevin,” Nicky countered. “You know he’ll be gone as soon as classes let out. Coach will probably have to fight him just to get him to attend his ceremony.”

“Mm. Fair.”

“So? Y’all? An Airbnb, just the five of us, beach getaway, come on! It’ll be nice to be able to just spend time together without worrying about anything, right?”

Andrew and Kevin ignored him from their places in the beanbag chairs, battling for first place on Mario Kart, while Aaron looked like he was thinking it over, so Neil asked, “Where to?”

“Myrtle Beach! It’s really nice there, there’s so much stuff to do even without the beach. There’s a boardwalk and tons of restaurants and rides, it’ll be fun! I promise, if we go, we’ll have fun.”

Neil’s first thought was how none of that sounds very much like his idea of fun, but then he remembered that he doesn’t have much of an idea of fun outside of the court and verbally sparring with Andrew. Then he thought how this time next year he’ll have to watch Kevin and Matt throw their caps in the air and then leave him behind. “Alright,” he said. “I’m in.”

There was little discussion after that.

\-----

Their first order of business is to stock the house for the three full days they’ll be spending here, which means a trip to the grocery and liquor stores. After that round of chaos is finished, the other three throw on swim trunks and tell Andrew and Neil that they’re headed to the beach. They take all the noise with them, and Neil is able to breathe a sigh of relief he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.

He wedges himself into a corner of the overstuffed couch, unable to shake the quiet melancholy that’s been plaguing him all day. Andrew patters around the house, getting his bearings and leaving Neil to zone out.

He doesn’t know why he feels this way, doesn’t really think he has a good excuse to. It’s a feeling that’s been creeping up more and more with the girls’ impending departure. He’s been ignoring it as much as he can, focusing on captaining the team next year, but sometimes, in quiet moments, it seeps into his bones and he feels overwhelmingly tired.

Andrew ambles out of the kitchen, sipping on a water bottle, and comes to a stop in front of Neil. “Yes or no?” he asks, staring intently down at Neil.

“Yes,” he says immediately.

But Andrew doesn’t lean in for a kiss; he caps his water bottle and shuffles forward until his knees hit the couch, legs bracketing Neil’s. Neil realizes what he wants, and relaxes back into the cushions, hooking his elbows up over the back of the couch. Only then does Andrew delicately settle himself in Neil’s lap, his bottom just barely touching the middle of Neil’s thighs, hands resting along Neil’s collarbones.

Neil blinks up at him, eyes flitting over his face, cataloguing all the tiny details the same way he does every time they’re so close together. The tiny white scar through his left eyebrow. The little mole right on his hairline, visible only because of his part. The few new freckles spattered across his cheeks and around his eyes from the summer sun.

“Staring,” Andrew says, predictably.

“So are you,” Neil retorts.

He doesn’t respond, just moves his hands so he can dip his thumbs beneath the collar of Neil’s t-shirt. “What’s the matter with you.”

There’s no inflection, but it’s a question all the same, and Neil knows Andrew is irritated at just having to ask it. He’s tempted to say _nothing_ , to return to the old mantra of _I’m fine_ , but with Andrew like this, hovering around him and keeping him grounded, protecting him, he wants to be honest. “I don’t really know.”

His head tilts. The afternoon light from the open blinds catches on the natural highlights of his hair and spins them into gold. “But you know a little.”

Neil sighs out through his nose, flexes his hands where they dangle behind the couch, out of sight. Andrew’s eyes flick to the muscle movement in Neil’s arms. “I don’t want them to leave.”

“They’re going to anyway.”

“I know.”

Andrew stares him down for a moment, and Neil lets him, allows himself to be looked over and observed. Whatever conclusion Andrew reaches has him rolling his eyes, scoffing so lightly it’s just a puff of air against Neil’s face. “You’ve always been stupidly sentimental, Josten,” he admonishes, leaning forward ever so slightly.

“I know,” Neil repeats, tilting his face up in a silent _yes_ to Andrew’s unspoken question, unable to stop his mouth from quirking up just slightly at the corners as Andrew’s lips touch his.

\-----

Despite a day full of travelling, getting groceries with the most obnoxious people in the world, and spending the better part of the afternoon getting sunburned and then trying to hide from the sun, Aaron can’t sleep. It’s like this every time he goes to a new place for the first time; until he spends a full 48 hours in that location, he doesn’t sleep easily within its walls.

Aaron is sitting in the backyard, trying to make out the stars behind the grimy orange layer of light pollution. Katelyn had texted him goodnight a little while ago, and he’s pretty sure he’s the only one in the house left awake, so he’d come out here. He’s found it in the past to be less depressing to contemplate under a night sky rather than a dark bedroom ceiling, and that holds true even now.

Nicky hasn’t been able to stop hinting about how nice this trip is, and how important family is, and Aaron gets it, really. Or— he gets it as much as he’s able to, he guesses. But he understands where Nicky’s coming from. His cousin had struggled for so long so try to hold onto his parents, his only family, any way he could until they forcibly pushed him from their lives. Even then, he’d made his own family in Germany and then left it all to take the twins in on the small technicality of shared blood.

Aaron doesn’t think he’ll ever understand it. Even Andrew, who Aaron has complicated feelings towards on the best of days, has sacrificed so much for the ones he holds on to. But Aaron isn’t like them. He never had anyone worth the risk of fighting for until Katelyn, and even then it had only been after she’d drawn the line.

So no, he can’t fully empathize with how Nicky feels, but he understands why his cousin brought up family about a hundred times that day. It’s their last summer with Kevin on the team, Kevin who’s just as much a part of the family as anyone who shares blood. Aaron knows Nicky’s worried that Kevin will leave and never contact any of them ever again, just like he’s afraid the twins will go their separate ways after their graduation and never speak again. It’s an absurd fear, but Aaron doesn’t know how to bring it up to comfort Nicky about.

He sighs and hangs his head back all the way, looking straight up in the sky. The night is warm and humid and still, permeated with the distant sounds of the boardwalk nightlife finding new haunts as everything closes down, and under that the low sounds of the waves crashing distantly on the shore. Fireflies float listlessly around the bushes surrounding the fence, lighting up just long enough for Aaron to follow them before they blink out of existence yet again.

His second sigh overlaps the soft closing of the sliding back door, and he jumps a little when Andrew asks, “What are you doing out here?”

Aaron leans back so he can crane his head around to look at his brother. “Sitting.”

Andrew doesn’t deem that with a response. Aaron turns back to perusing the off-black sky as Andrew wanders around the backyard. He’s surprised when Andrew sits down next to him, hands folded daintily in his lap, but he doesn’t comment on it until Andrew raises his cupped hands up towards Aaron.

“Look,” he says, and opens his hands just enough to reveal two glowing fireflies.

Aaron raises his eyebrows. “How’d you catch them?”

Andrew shrugs, and opens his hands all the way so the bugs can take flight. One returns to the bushes, while the other drifts lazily around their heads. It only goes back to where it’s from when Aaron holds out a finger towards it, half-hoping it will land on him.

“Nicky thinks we’re never going to speak to each other again after we graduate.” Andrew shoots him a look out of the corner of his eye, digging his lighter out of his pocket and clicking it open and closed, open and closed. “All of us, I mean. But I think he’s mostly afraid of us two not.”

Andrew hums. _Click, click, click, click._ “He shouldn’t be.”

Aaron looks at him. “We really don’t talk that much now.”

 _Click, click._ “There’s this hip new thing called Facebook-”

Aaron can’t stop the bark of laughter from escaping him. He notes Andrew still in surprise, but he ignores it to say, “ _God_ , you sound older than coach right now, I can’t believe you just called something _hip_ -”

“I’m not the one who used to call everything _hella_ ,” Andrew retorts, tone still flat but somehow more at ease than it usually is.

Aaron scoffs. “We’re from California, we’re allowed to say _hella_ without sounding like total douches.”

“Unfortunately for you, you always sound like a total douche, _brah_.”

“You realize that means you do too, right? Since we literally sound the same?”

“Wrong. I don’t talk like a valley girl.”

“Fuck off,” Aaron says, laughing.

They sit in silence for a few moments before, surprisingly, Andrew opens his mouth. “Nicky was there, at the trial. He heard everything.”

It sobers Aaron immediately. Andrew’s never brought up last summer of his own volition, whether in therapy or out, and even Aaron knows better not to press about it. Truthfully, there are some things he hasn’t had the mental fortitude to sort out for himself about those revelations. Or the courage.

“You were both there.” Andrew’s shoulders are tense, and part of Aaron wants to beg him to just let this lie, but- “Never seeing each other again is not an option.”

It takes a moment for the meaning behind his words to sink in, and when it does, Aaron finds himself slowly relaxing. He looks over at his brother, staring resolutely ahead. “Should we put Nicky out of his misery, or… just let him figure it out?”

Andrew looks at him. Clicks his lighter again.

“Yeah, he’ll figure it out.”

\-----

Their last night at Myrtle Beach is spent under the glowing technicolor lights of the boardwalk.

Neil’s face under the alternating shades of red and blue is almost breathtaking, the contours of his face and the wild shock of hair draped over his forehead making _something_ stutter momentarily in Andrew’s chest. Neil doesn’t notice, too busy following Nicky and Aaron’s ascent on the Skywheel, up up up into the heavens.

Kevin stands on Neil’s other side, faced the other way with his elbows on the railing as he looks out into the dark water. He’s been texting Thea intermittently all night, something Andrew knows is new to both of them, but which seems to be going well if Kevin’s lack of overall grumpiness is to be believed.

The wheel stops, and a single loud _whoop_ rings out. Neil sighs. “He’s rocking the carriage.”

Andrew chances a quick glance upward; sure enough, there is one lone carriage rocking to and fro. He can very clearly imagine his cousin’s cackling face from 187 feet in the air next to his brother’s determined grimace.

“If they fall, at least the ride back will be quieter,” Kevin says, still looking over the water.

Neil rolls his eyes over at Andrew, and whatever he’d been about to say dries up as soon as Neil makes eye contact with him.

All week Neil had either been preoccupied with his own pointless fears or with meddling in everyone else’s affairs, a coping mechanism that Andrew is so completely tired of. But tonight he finally seems to have remembered exactly what Andrew had spelled out so blatantly for him in a hotel room in Baltimore not long enough ago.

Andrew looks away towards the bottom of the Skywheel, studying the man working the controls, only to look back when Neil asks, “Can I?”

Andrew raises an eyebrow, and Neil lightly taps the brim of Andrew’s baseball cap. “Yes.”

Neil gently takes the cap off Andrew’s head and, slowly so he can stop him if necessary, reaches up and brushes Andrew’s hair back off his forehead before replacing the cap. He taps the brim lightly one last time before turning back to the Skywheel, now moving once more.

Kevin sighs loudly. Andrew somehow restrains himself from throwing him over the railing.

Aaron and Nicky make their way back to them, loud and bright in a different way than they usually are on a weekend at Eden’s, and they continue on down the boardwalk, content right now to just look around at everything it has to offer. Andrew’s eyes keep flicking to Neil, at ease for the first time since they’d gotten to Myrtle Beach.

He has vague memories as a young child of separation anxiety and the fear of abandonment. He’d learned quickly how to cope with it until he’d stopped wanting people around him at all. But he realizes that the rest of his family isn’t like that. Kevin and Nicky will keep themselves in Andrew’s life by force if they have to; he knows this and allows it because he wants them there. Aaron and Neil, though, are too used to being pushed around and pushed away. They’re the ones that require effort to include, the ones that are most exhausting for Andrew to deal with, so he usually lets someone else deal with their issues.

Usually. Last night he’d fallen asleep with Neil’s heartbeat under his palm, and this morning he’d woken up the same way. He refuses to entertain the notion that this is the reason Neil is in a better mood today.

“Hey.” He looks over to see Neil standing beside him, fiddling with the cuffs of his long-sleeved t-shirt. “The others are getting ahead. We should catch up to them.”

“They’ll come back for us,” he says, and then when Neil opens his mouth, “Abram. They will come back for us.”

Neil looks him in the eye for a moment before his gaze flickers away to the side. He pulls his sleeves down to cover his palms, uncomfortable.

Andrew brings his arm up to rest his palm along the back of Neil’s neck, carefully cataloguing how it makes him relax. “How much money do you have?”

He squints for a moment in confusion before his face clears. “Probably enough for an ice cream cone or two.”

“The planets have aligned. Let’s go.” He gives Neil a nudge in the direction of the small ice cream shop Andrew had been dawdling by, and ignores the small smile playing around Neil’s mouth.


End file.
